THE ROLLING STONES KEEP ROLLING ALONG

Nothing much, but here is what is happening around the world today:

• The U.S. is sending a third aircraft carrier fleet to the Middle East.  Not a good sign for peace before the mid-term elections.
• The national unemployment rate ticked up to 4.2%.
• The U.S. Supreme Court has begun a new term.
• From USA Today:

'Perfect storm': El Niño goes off the charts

A record-high ocean temperature has been measured in a key El Niño region of the Pacific Ocean, and scientists say it likely hasn't reached its peak.

• 
  Rachel became a hurricane on September 30, with a path towards Hawaii.
• Quickly strengthened into a Category 3 at 120 MPH yesterday, but dropped today to 110.
• All projections show continued weakening, while maintaining hurricane strength for the next few days.
• Still headed for Hawaii, but the extreme danger quotient looks low.

• In the West Pacific, Choi-Wan became a typhoon today south of Japan.
• Projections indicate a strengthening to Category 3 status, heading straight for Honshu.
• However, models show that the eye of Choi-Wan on October 5 will begin to turn more northernly, and eventually on a path to keep it sufficiently far enough away from Japan, unlike Typhoon Dujuan which earlier this month caused major damage and nine deaths. 

• Remember Hurricane Nolo? She threatened Hawaii a few days ago.
• On September 26, she was moving westward as a Category 2 south of Honolulu, causing little damage.
• Weakened to 90 MPH on September 27.
• Then became a super hurricane on September 28 at 155 MPH.
• Moving west, Nolo dropped to 45 MPH yesterday.
• However, today re-strengthened to 70 MPH.
• Will again become a hurricane tomorrow, and strengthen to a Category 2 the day after, still moving west.
• At that point, Hurricane Nolo will be well north of Guam and the Northern Marianas, but with a path towards Kyushu, Japan!

• There are no signs of any forming hurricanes in the Atlantic Basin and Gulf of Mexico.  If these regions get none in 2026, this will be the first time in 129 years.

It's amazing that the Rolling Stones have been so active for so long.

• They formed in London in 1962 when I was still in college, and 64 years later, remain relevant.
• They were supposed to tour in 2026, but cancelled.  Keith Richard said he was already too old.

• 
  They did release an album this year, Foreign Tongues,  and Mick Jagger is anxious to have one more tour next year.  While he hopes for the usual city after city standard, there are indications that, at their age, perhaps a "residency" final round might make more sense.  Fewer cities, staying in one spot for a bit longer.
• How old are they?
• Mick Jagger is 83.
• Keith Richards, 82
• Ronnie Wood, 79
• Drummer Charlie Watts passed away in 2021 at the age of 80.
• 
  Drummer now is Steve Jordan, an American who is 69 years old.  
• The remaining three are from England.
• Jordan has won Emmys, and has played with many:  Blues Brothers, Bee Gees, George Benson, Beyoncé, Booker T & the MGs, Eric Clapton, Kelly Clarkson, Sheryl Crow, Bob Dylan, Roberta Flack, Aretha Franklin, Debbie Gibson, Vince Gill, Josh Groban....I'm only up to the letter G.

• 
  Some history, from Wikipedia.  Never saw this before, but their coverage is so long that there is a warning from this site.
• Started as the Blues Boys in March 1962.
• The Rolling Stones became so in July of 1962, with Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Brian Jones, Billy Wyman and Charlie Watts.  Led by Jones, who named the group.

• 
  Rooted in blues and early rock and roll, playing cover versions.
• Signed Andrew Oldham as their manager in 1963.  He was then only 19, and his mother had to co-sign the contract.  Oldham's previous clients?  The Beatles. He was the one who made the Stones animalistic and undesirable, compared to The Beatles.  It worked.
• At the forefront of the British Invasion of 1964.

• 
  Now famous, they began to play their own compositions like Satisfaction,(you gotta watch this...a really young Mick), Get Off of My Cloud and Paint it Black.  In 1966, their Aftermath album was all their original material.
• Need to play Jumping Jack Flash.  Only a 33/58 rating from Rotten Tomatoes.  Now 40 years old, but was led by Whoopie Goldberg, and a cast before they became famous:  Carol Kane, Jonathan Pryce, John Lovitz, Phil Hartman, Tracey Ullman and Jim Belushi.
• There were problems with Brian Jones, and he left the band a few weeks before his death in 1969, and was replaced by Mick Taylor.
• Formed their own record label in 1970, starting with Stick Fingers in 1971, for which that tongue and lips logo was created.  Seven more albums were released, all reaching #1 on Billboard.

• 
  Taylor left in 1974, and was replaced by Ronnie Wood.  That group of Jagger, Richards, Watts and Woods survived for almost 50 years until Watts died in 2021.  That year, they were the highest-earning live act.
• Mick Jagger was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 2003.  Only member so honored.
• Have sold more than 250 million albums, winning four Grammys and a lifetime achievement award.

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SOCIAL MEDIA CAN BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH...But Also Entertaining

By, the way, we are now into October.  Something is going right. Sort of.  From Time magazine:

23 YEARS  

The U.S. withdrew its last military forces from Iraq on Wednesday, 23 years after the 2003 invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein. The final troops left Erbil Air Base in the Kurdistan region, the Pentagon said.

Was this good news?  Yes, but.....

The age of Artificial Intelligence, AI, is upon us.  There is that matter of existential threat, but here are nine benefits.  

 AI is the branch of computer science dedicated to creating machines that are able to think like humans.

There are negatives aside from that existential threat matter.  Here is just one:  I read, Push Back:  Deepfake online heath scams.  Article begins with:

SOCIAL MEDIA CAN BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH.

Ever stumble across statements like: 

Elon Musk Reveals The 15-Second Vicks Trick For Memory Loss and Dementia!

and

We invited Dr. Sanjay Gupta to reveal all the details of the 7-second honey ritual. He shared — for free — how to prepare this recipe at home, why it's so effective, and much more.

Returning to that article by Al Norman of the Greenfield Recorder:

In my social media reels from Instagram, Facebook and YouTube, I receive “sponsored” deepfake health care cures and “tricks” to reverse Alzheimer’s, shrink prostates, or repair blurred vision. It’s an endless screed of bogus health headlines featuring cultural icons like Anthony Fauci, Anderson Cooper, Bill Gates, Mehmet Oz, Clint Eastwood, Bruce Willis, and Denzel Washington. Most of these influencers are AI deepfakes.

These videos can spin on for 45 minutes, ending with a sales pitch for miracle pills — before stocks run out. What begins as a “baking soda and honey trick” turns into a list of ginseng extract, pink Himalayan salt, evergreen tree, and angelica extract. A “Blueberry Trick” promises a “natural cure for dementia and even Alzheimer’s.” A “warm water method” to regulate your blood sugar turns into a pitch to eliminate a parasite in your prostate, narrated by two doctors peddling pumpkin seed oil and Japanese saw palmetto. On a “privacy policy” page, one video sponsor offers this disclaimer: “It’s important to consult your doctor before making any dietary or lifestyle changes. Individual results may vary and results are not guaranteed.”

Ever been trapped by some of the above?  Google AI says:

Fake Endorsements: Scammers use AI-cloned voices and faces of high-profile figures—like Elon Musk, Tom Hanks, and Dr. Sanjay Gupta—to trick people into believing there is a miraculous, hidden medical breakthrough. [1, 2, 3]

You should know that:

• Making a deepfake is not automatically illegal.
• Depends on content, consent, purpose, jurisdiction, etc.

• 
  Okay for most parody, satire, fiction and art.
• If determined to be illegal, the U.S. Take it Down Act (2025) still gives a platform the option to avoid prosecution by removing it within 48 hours.
• The EU AI Act, in force August 2026, requires most deepfakes to be labeled even when the content is lawful, with fines up to tens of millions of euros.
• Deepfake laws vary widely around the world.
• Bottomline, avoid being scammed, but if you mistakenly follow-up, consult a qualified lawyer for your situation.

The elderly are especially targeted.   From the American Association of Retired Persons.

• AARP indicates that the most-impersonated celebrity are, #1, MrBeast, and #2, Elon Musk.
• Elon Musk is the richest person in the world, so that's why?
• But why is MrBeast #1?
• His brand is built around massive cash and prize giveaways.
• Jimmy Donaldson, who is MrBeast, is the world's most-subscribed person on You Tube.
• He is trusted by children and teens.
• Often involve with philanthropy, lowering your natural guard.
• Is a billionaire.

• If you are personally contacted by famous people, beware.

However AI can also entertain.

• Here is a site you can use to create Barack Obama singing any song you wish.
• We all know that Donald Trump loves the Village People singing YMCA at his rallies.  Here is an AI-generated parody of he doing the entertaining.

• 
  Word leaders unite in AI-generated We Are The World.
• Japan's Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi featured in an AI-generated song, Land of Dawn.

• 
  Joe Biden and Frank Sinatra's My Way.
• AI-generated list of U.S. presidents.
• According to Google AI, Donald Trump himself posted on 17May2025 a surreal, AI-generation video performing Journey's Don't Stop Believin'.

• 
  Here is Journey's version.
• America's Got Talent 2024 champion, Richard Goodall, singing this song with members of Journey.

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MAGIC CAN HAPPEN IF YOU TRY

 I have lived a charmed life, made so by moments of magic.

• I'm 86 years old, healthy and happy.
• I have not yet spent a night as a patient in any hospital.
• I've had two personal relationships that were important to what I am today.  I'll keep these private.
• I've accumulated more than 3 million air miles, mostly on Star Alliance.

• 
  Been on a dozen, or two, cruises.
• Have had maybe 15 around the world trips.
• Written five books.
• Worked on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence for NASA.
• Wrote the the legislation that became law for hydrogen when I worked in the U.S. Senate.
• In my 27th year of retirement.

Not sure who said SOMETIMES MAGIC CAN HAPPEN IF YOU TRY.  Checked with various AI sources and got nothing.

In a way, though, that thought has driven me through most of my life.  The first time was when I was a junior in high school.  

• 
  That was 70 years ago.
• Through all of my life as a student, I was just above average.  In my sophomore year at McKinley High School in Honolulu I was not in the top English/Social Studies class.
• I have noticed that I don't one day just try something new.  Something traumatic needs to happen to my life to kick me out of my normal ennui.  In 1956 my family got evicted from our home in Kakaako by Ward Estates when they began to develop what is now Ward Village.

• 
  We moved to Kalihi, and I had to catch a bus my final two years to McKinley High School.
• In my junior year, I had two fabulous teachers, Mildred Kosaki in English/Social Studies (I must have done reasonably well in my sophomore year because I was promoted to this top junior class) and Sueko Hirokawa in the sciences.  I have a posting about these two teachers, titled CROSSROADS:  Stanford University.
• 
  This article also traced why I chose to even try to get into Stanford.
• A second trauma occurred, breaking my wrist, which led me into more magic.  
• I end with the rest of this story from that posting.

An incredible series of luck helped.  First, my family was forced to move away from Kakaako at the end of my sophomore year at McKinley. (This was the necessary trauma.)  My gang was just a bunch of loyal friends.   There were a dozen of us and by the time everyone got together we were almost always late to our home rooms.  This meant we were penalized by being kept after school for an hour.  Frankly, there was nothing in their attitude that compromised my studies, but the physical separation I think was a factor in changing my general attitude about my future.

Second, students (from public schools in Honolulu) normally worked in the pineapple cannery between their junior and senior years.  I broke my wrist playing basketball in April.  (The trauma.)  This resulted in, perhaps, two most important consequences:

• I had never run for any kind of office in my life (and since then never did again).  I don't know how this happened, but I found myself campaigning for Senior Class vice president against three females, one who was heavily favored, and went on to later becoming Narcissus Queen.  The combination of gender ratio advantage and the cast on my wrist was just enough for me to prevail.  As vice president I also was to become chairman of the commencement and a bunch of other leadership roles.
• As I couldn't work in the cannery, I decided to memorize the words in a guide on how to do well on the Scholastic Aptitude Test.  After just a couple of months of this intensive activity, my verbal score improved from the 200's to high 600's, with my math score close to 800, the maximum.

In my sophomore year some of my friends on the tennis team asked me to join them, as they were short of members.  Never having played before, from the end of my sophomore year to much of my senior year I must have spent 690 out of 700 days on the courts, which was the norm for the group.  In those days McKinley and Roosevelt were the only public schools competing against Punahou, Iolani, Kamehameha and Mid-Pac.  Those private schools gave tennis scholarships, so we should have had no real chance of beating them.  But we did, and by, again, a fate of  luck, I was the third singles, which meant I was the fifth best player on the team, as the third and fourth served as the first doubles.  Each private school only had a few scholarship players, and when it came to their fifth best, they were no better than I was.  So I proceeded to win most of my matches, if not all of them, even though I would not have been able to beat the top players from McKinley. (This was the only athletic activity I had in my Stanford application form.  This box had to be checked.)

While in my sophomore year I was a below average student, by the end of my senior year, I was among the best students in the state, for I went on to win various honors, like the Bausch and Lomb Science medal, an Elks Scholarship, a Science Fair award, had both a poem and an essay published in a national anthology and carried pretty much a straight A average.

A school like Stanford not only looks at your grade average and SAT scores.  The extra-curricula activities are maybe more important.  It was not like in high school I had reached a certain crossroad and dedicated my life to accumulating all these impacting factors like class officership, success on my tennis team and high college board scores.  Those things, mostly through luck and circumstances, just happened.  (Again, traumas and acts of magic.)

Thus, I never even bothered to apply to the University of Hawaii.  I just took a chance on Stanford and the California Institute of Technology.  CalTech accepted me, and that was my first choice, for they only accepted around 250/year and was generally considered to be the most difficult school to get into.  However, their financial package was limited.  Luckily, Stanford provided a full scholarship with tuition waiver, room and board paid and a part time job working in the library.  In follow-up discussions with teachers and counselors I picked Stanford.  CalTech would have led me into a totally different way of life.

If I had at the beginning analyzed the reality and also the economics of going away to college, any kind of common sense would have convinced me to stay home for college.  This experience of shooting for the best against all odds, and succeeding, changed my whole life attitude.  Then, graduating from Stanford provided the most important payoff:  CONFIDENCE.  

But the key combination was unpredictable trauma, followed by successful comeback, leading to a magical conclusion.  This fusion has occurred throughout my life. 

Even worked on laser fusion at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.  But my time there was just another eventual act of magic.

A lot more magic after I graduated, which could form the basis of a future posting.  A more recent bit of magic was moving into 15 Craigside, a senior's community.

• I've now been here 12 years.
• Life is secure and comfortable.
• Here is our meal schedule for this week.

• 
  Not quite CHOCOLATE, CAVIAR, FOIE GRAS AND TRUFFLES EXTRAVAGANZA ON THE SILVER WHISPER, the title of a day on our cruise from which we returned earlier this month.  And I should add champagne, vodka, wine and more.

• 
  But too much of that kind of food is just not good for my body.  The five-week trip we took to the Total Solar Eclipse in Iceland and Greenland resulted in my gaining 12 pounds, which I was shocked to learn was physically possible for me.  How did that trip go?

• SO HOW WAS OUR LATEST TRIP?: Part 3
• SO HOW WAS OUR LATEST TRIP?: Part 2
• SO HOW WAS OUR LATEST TRIP?

• 
  The good news is that through simple dieting, still consuming meals like what you see above, plus a lot of soup and salad meals, I lost 12.5 pounds in 9 days at 15 Craigside.  By all measures, this was like magic, for I didn't think this was attainable.
• I also found out why my knees ached when I walked.  I was too heavy.  The pain went away when I lost 12.5 pounds.  Can you image how much added stress carrying a ten pound bag of sugar, and two additional pounds, can do to your joints?
• My next bit of magic?  

To close, a few cartoons from the Stanford Daily.

Stanford and Cal Berkely are close rivals.

You won't know what this final cartoon is all about unless you are familiar with the Stanford Marshmallow Test.

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